Maximum's Land of Snippets
by MaximumTrekkie
Summary: Just the dumping ground for snippets I've written for Worm.
1. Caliber

Winslow is hell, and anyone who says different is a lying liar who lies as their pants are on fire. Bullies and gangsters are goddamn everywhere. Turn down a hallway to avoid Emma and her minions and run straight into some ABB thugs looking at you menacingly. You turn to go back where you came from and then suddenly E88 skinheads. There's even graffiti and gang tags on the walls! Seriously, what the hell kind of school even is this? Getting trapped in a locker a few weeks back was just the diarrhea icing on the shit cake.

Still, at least Winslow didn't cost me my leg. The Merchants did that. Or rather, Squealer did.

There's a story there, and not a long one. Squealer comes flying down the street in some disgusting metal monstrosity as I'm walking on a crosswalk. I _almost _make it. Then I trip and fall on my face. I bring the knee of my right leg up quickly to try and get out of the way, but my left leg is still hit and crushed. More like shredded _and _crushed, actually. It was disgusting to look at and I puked as soon as I crawled away from the road onto the sidewalk.

So here I am, sobbing and frantically asking someone to _call a goddamn ambulance_ and generally going into hysterics when I see Glory Girl fly past without even a glance in my direction. When I thought about it later, that kinda pissed me off. Eventually, someone does call an ambulance, and I go to the hospital. I end up in the Emergency Room. Long story short, my left leg is amputated below the knee because Panacea was busy with another victim, I'm out for a while, and Dad comes in and looks like he's about three seconds from declaring a one-man war on the Merchants after I wake up.

I almost dropped back into hysterics after seeing my left leg gone, but then I remembered something. I am a goddamn tinker. I'll build myself a better leg, this time with 100% more laser beams and dakka. I spent a little time calming Dad down, and a few days later we're going home, with me in a wheelchair.

That brings us to the present day. Well, present night. It's been three weeks since I lost my leg, and I've been working the whole time trying to build a replacement. It was slow going- I had to scavenge materials from around the house, mostly, and the couple forays out of the house I did had to be _very _close by. I mean, couldn't exactly run anywhere and getting Dad to being me to junkyards or helping me go dumpster diving would raise several rather uncomfortable questions. This made it extremely difficult to actually get the parts I needed. I would probably only be able to create a stopgap that would let me get the stuff to build the kind of prosthetic I really wanted.

My tinker specialty wasn't exactly helping either, making the leg require more materials that it would otherwise need. You see, my specialty was weapons. Weapons and munitions. Within that field, I could build anything- including a prosthetic leg, so long as it had a weapon in it. The whole 'as long as it had a weapons in it' thing was what was causing me problems. Still, it was a surprisingly broad specialty, letting me build almost anything so long as you could use it as a weapon or shoot it out of something. I had decided on putting a small gun that could kinda shoot forwards and up a little or detach and be used by hand. It was a dinky little thing, barely .22 and hardly worth the title of "gun", but it would have to do. For the leg I wanted long-term, I would probably go for firearm storage or maybe have a small extendable and foldable particle beam...hmm.

Well, that was for later. I put the finishing touches on the leg of crappiness and pushed back my rolly chair to look at it. It looked somewhat skeletal, much like regular modern prosthetics. It also had a small button on the front that would let the teeny gun barrel poke out and another button that would eject the gun into my waiting hand so I could actually hit something with it. The whole thing could really use some more work. It wasn't exactly what came to mind when you thought of tinkertech prosthetics, and it really wasn't much better than a regular metal leg, but it would work for a time.

I couldn't wait until I could make a better leg that would act like a real one and let me walk like a regular person. A regular person with a gun inside their leg. Their metal leg. Eh, close enough. I pulled the gun I had made off of a small shelf, being extra careful not to touch the trigger. It may be a dinky little thing but Dad would probably hear an accidental discharge down here and that was the last thing I needed. Not to mention the difficult to acquire and effectively irreplaceable equipment down here as well. I inserted it into the slot for the leg and closed it up, concealing the little weapon.

I pulled the leg off of my workbench and slipped it onto my stump. It fit perfectly, as designed. I stood up and took a few steps. I sorta had to flex my thigh muscles to move it but I had made it lightweight enough that it wasn't too hard. I smiled. It was a new day, a new chapter in my life, and from now on, I wasn't going to take any shit!

Speaking of not taking any shit...Emma. If I was going to become the badass I was meant to be, I would need to get her to lay off. Sophia and Madison too. I had a few ideas for that. It had been nearly three months since The Locker (insert dramatic sound effect here) so it was pretty much impossible to nail them for that, which might have gotten them expelled or suspended for a while. I mean, seriously. If the prosecutor was enthusiastic enough they could probably get put up on bioterrorism charges, at least according to my research. _Bioterrorism_. Like, holy shit.

Still, there was no shortage of other stuff they had done. I had my journal keeping track of everything, but that wasn't enough evidence to get Blackwell off her lazy ass. No, I would need definitive proof.

Cameras. Cameras would work. Build a tiny launcher for them, or maybe make them spotting cameras for artillery or something? That should satisfy the weapon requirement. We already had a computer to hook them to, Dad had bought it after I was confined to a wheelchair. I mean, it was a little bit shit, but it should work for this. They would transmit to me, not directly though. Can't risk it being traced. Maybe a little paranoid, but I think you can never be too cautious. This would have to be routed through a few proxies. Get some footage and then I could nail them.

After that…

After that, I was going to be a supervillain.


	2. Shuffled

I thanked the cashier of the gas station as I slipped the pack of cigarettes into the pocket of my hoodie. I walked out the door, little bell tinkling as it opened. I sunk into my hoodie a little more, putting my hands in the pockets, and started trudging out onto the sidewalk. Frowning, I looked down at my watch. It was nearly nine o'clock. Dad would be worried. Then again, maybe he wouldn't be. You could never tell these days. He might not even notice.

Shrugging a little to myself, I pulled my phone out of my pocket and called home. Nobody picked up so I put the phone back into my pocket. It had been worth a try, at least. Most days he acted more like a zombie than a human but occasionally he would actually notice something was wrong or different. Apparently today wasn't one of those days.

Probably a good thing, in hindsight. Best if he doesn't know I go out and buy smokes every couple weeks from one of the few gas stations that'll sell them without asking for any ID. There were a few others like that, but they were mostly in the 'bad part of town'. Or at least a part of town that was worse than this one. Pretty much every part of Brockton Bay was the 'bad part of town', except for Downtown and the Boardwalk.

In fact, since Dad apparently hadn't noticed I was coming home late, maybe I would take a trip to the Boardwalk. Not like I would be able to buy anything, but it might be fun to window shop. My sister hadn't been keen on it recently, so the only time I got to was when I was alone.

I wandered around, looking into various windows and seeing if there was anything cool. There didn't seem to be all that much, so I sat down on a bench and started watching people instead. I saw a girl with dark brown hair doing the same as I was a bench over. There was a fat man wearing a hawaiian shirt talking boisterously with a tall man in a golf shirt. Huh. People actually wear hawaiian shirts? You learn something new every day.

I was so busy thinking about the mysteries of life and hawaiian shirts I almost didn't notice the costumed heroine floating a few feet above eye level. She wore a one-piece dress that went down to mid thigh with shorts underneath, an over the shoulder cape, boots, and a golden tiara over her platinum blonde hair.

Glory Girl.

I felt her aura already. My lip curled slightly in disgust as I watched her. Of course she was here, why wouldn't she be. She couldn't be patrolling or something, this was the boardwalk. Was she just looking for attention? I wondered why that seemed so...annoying, when applied to her. I never did like attention seekers, but something about her just made me angry. Maybe it was the aura. Or maybe...maybe it was her parents, and how she looked so much like them.

I stood and put my hands in my pocket, turning my face away from her and dipping my head a little to obscure my face. I started walking away quickly, scowling all the while. Dammit, I needed a smoke. I ducked into an alley and fumbled with the pack of cigarettes and lighter as I took them out of my pockets. I pulled one out, lit it, and started smoking. I relaxed a little. Maybe a little too much, since a man in shabby clothes managed to sneak up behind me and put a knife to my throat. I froze.

Or rather, he did. I seized control of his nervous system and made him pull the knife away from me before knocking him out and giving him a dose of a chemical that would make him forget the last few minutes and give him a decent headache.

Welp, that was today thoroughly ruined. Wonderful. Just dandy. The only way it could get worse would be if Glory Girl saw me come over here and decided to say hello…

I quickly scanned the skies. Nope, no human Barbie doll floating around up there. Phew. Bullet Dodged. Well, Alexandria package with master powers dodged. She's about the last person I ever want to learn that I'm a cape. Especially since I'm already half convinced Brandish would march down to my house and finish the job she started when she arrested my father.

I walk home a little faster this time, and without any more smoke breaks. Maybe Dad hadn't noticed my absence, but my sister certainly would, and her powers were almost as terrifying as mine, although in a very different way. Thinkers were like that. Hell, she'd probably know what I had done today just by looking at me. I'd know when I got inside. Maybe she would be asleep? Or maybe she would just ignore me?

Nah. She's gonna be pissed. She'll give me that one glare that makes me want to shrivel up and die. She could do that before she was a Thinker, and now that she is she can use it to truly devastating effect. I'm just like, damn, we got a professional glarer up in here!

I really should open that door. Oh well, it was nice knowing me.

Aaaaand yep. There she is. Looking at me like she's staring into my soul. She probably is. And there's the glare of DOOM. Yuuuuup, she's pissed. Shit. Double shit. Tetruple shit.

"Please don't hurt me!" I cry as she drags me inside by my forearm.

"Oh, we're far past hurting. Which limb do you want me to lop off?" She asks, her voice playful but still holding an edge.

"But I need all of them!" I whine, pouting.

She sighs and pinches the bridge of her nose.

"Amelia, you can't keep breaking curfew like this. And you were smoking too. Smoking is bad for you, you know. What if Dad found out?" she demanded.

"About the smoking or the curfew?" I asked, sprawling out on the couch.

"Either! I know you can't get cancer or anything but he'll still freak out. And the curfew thing...if he suspects we're breaking curfew he'll be more watchful and it'll be harder to sneak out and be The Court. We'd have to tell him, and he still hasn't gotten over Mom's death at all and he'd be all overprotective," she said, frowning.

"I know sis. I'm sorry. Say, how are the costumes going? Do you need any more material?" I asked, hoping to change the subject.

"They're done, I think. Well, ours are. Emma's will take another day or so to get the generator and wiring set up, but ours are much simpler," she says, walking towards the basement and beckoning at me to follow.

"So are Duchess and Marchioness soon to take the streets?" I asked, almost running down the stairs in my excitement.

"Yeah, as soon as I get the Baroness costume done."

We both entered the little room off to the side that my sister had been making our costumes in. There were three wooden looking mannequin things, each one sized differently.

One was my size, and had a white robe trimmed in red with a red caduceus on each shoulder. The mask was a white half mask trimmed in red with swirling designs of the same color on it that left the bottom half of my face visible.

The second was fitted for Emma, and was empty for the moment, her costume laid out over a bench nearby with a small electric generator and a spool of wires lying next to it. Emma was a brute, but her power required some things ours didn't.

The third and last mannequin held a white suit with a white shirt and red vest and tie. A white fedora sat atop the mannequins head while a mask nearly identical to my own except for some minor added designs on the front was attached to its face. White gloves and combat boots finished the costume.

I smiled. It was all coming together. We would follow in my father's footsteps and be what the Bay really needed, and fix this broken city. I looked at my sister and grinned.

Taylor Hebert smiled back at me.


	3. Inspired

I worked frantically, trying to assemble the components I needed to finish the weapon. Scientific principles so far over the heads of everyone else on Earth Bet that it looped around from not even being funny to being funny again flew through my head at the speed of light.

I couldn't escape this time. The teleporters that were supposed to send me and my lab into my pocket dimension had been sabotaged somehow- they just wouldn't work. I suspected the Simurgh had something to do with it. Bitch had been chasing me for nearly two years now.

Just as I put the finishing touches on the weapon that I hoped would save my lift, an alarm sounded behind me. Endbringer, Leviathan, Brockton Bay, T minus 5 minutes. My old hometown and my current port of call.

I was out of time. I shrugged on my suit of armor, seven feet of imposing majesty. It was built a bit like Adeptus Astartes power armor from Warhammer 40k, but slimmer, and the power pack didn't protrude nearly as much. It was matte black with golden cogs on each pauldron. The eyepieces glowed red.

This thing was almost as durable as Alexandria and filled with safeguards against almost every conceivable power. Master powers, Shaker powers, Striker powers, anything. Leviathan wouldn't hold back nearly as much as normal, not against me. If I didn't want to lose more limbs or even my life to getting the blood removed from them, I would need this suit.

Next was the weapon I had just built. I called it the Siberium sword. It should cut through literally anything, including Alexandria or an Endbringer. Today would be its first test. If all went well, Leviathan would fall today.

If all didn't go well…

It didn't bear thinking about. That was a waste of precious thinking time. Time had been in short supply for years now ever since Ziz decided I needed to die. I was constantly assaulted by parahumans and normal humans, Ziz-bombs and people trying to capture me for their own gain. The other two Endbringers tended to attack whatever city I was in too.

Usually I would have bailed by now, but, you know, broken teleporter.

I stepped out of my lab and activated my jump pack (rather improved from the kind used in 40k) and flew over to the staging area. I drew eyes. Many, many eyes. The armor alone would likely have done most of that, but my reputation was known worldwide.

They called me Harbinger.

Whenever I appeared in a city, things went to shit. Simurgh-bombs popped out of the woodwork, The Fallen came calling, and often an Endbringer would make an appearance- sometimes even breaking their regular schedule to try and kill me.

A lot of people blamed me for all of that. The Protectorate was at the forefront. I had been labelled a Villain and they claimed that I was somehow causing this. For the life of me, I couldn't figure out why they had thrown me under the bus. It made no sense, forced me to go it alone, to be independent. It also made no sense that they hadn't given me a Kill Order yet if they really did blame me for this.

I resolved to think of that later. There was work to be done. I grabbed an armband and stated my name. People were still staring. I was starting to get a little uncomfortable. I had tended to avoid people even before I was a famous bad luck charm, and I had done so even more afterwards. I wasn't used to things like this.

"Finally got the balls to attend one of these?" someone said.

I looked to my left and at the person who had spoken. Defiant. Formerly Armsmaster- had been Armsmaster up until he kept trying and failing miserably to capture me for a year after saying on live TV that he would. On top of some other scandals he was involved in, it sank his career.

"Someone sabotaged my teleporter. It's fight or die, now," I said calmly, my voice harsh and metallic after being put through the suit's voice modulator.

"So now you're stuck like the rest of us, huh?" he said, seemingly getting some kind of perverse enjoyment out of taunting me.

"Yes," I said with finality, turning my head forwards and endeavoring to ignore him from now on.

Legend gave his simultaneously rousing and depressing speech and then we were off to fight. I used a short range teleport to get out of the staging building before the wave hit. My sensors detected Leviathan immediately. He was coming right for me, fast.

I activated my jump pack and charged forward, drawing my sword at the same time. I brought my sword down, but Leviathan dodged at the last second, and I just barely clipped his claw, taking a chunk off. Clearly I would need to be faster for this fight.

I dosed myself with my special cocktail of mental-power boosting drugs and just barely avoided gasping as the world exploded into clarity and began to move in slow motion at the same time. I whipped around, facing Leviathan once more, firing the cannon mounted on my left arm as I did so.

The gun carved little pockets of scaly flesh out of the Endbringer but did little else. Leviathan began moving towards me again. I boosted again, seemingly replicating my first attack. However, this time I jerked myself to the side and cleaved through Leviathan's shoulder.

My blade met no resistance.

If I hadn't used my combat drugs I would've been smacked by his tail because of my sheer surprise, but I was able to dodge. I boosted forwards again, and cut through the monster's tail as he tried to hit me with it.

I grinned under my helmet. Finally, I could take my revenge on these monsters and end my living nightmare.

Other capes began firing at Leviathan, but we had eyes only for each other. He began using his hydrokinesis to throw me off, having tried and failed to kill me by leaching out my blood earlier. I was having none of it, my armor ignoring the water as if it was nothing. I was an immovable object and unstoppable force in one huge package.

This time, I wanted to bisect him. We ran towards each other once more, moving at top speed. My aim was true. My sword bisected Leviathan, entering in the waist and exiting through the base of the tail stub.

Leviathan's two halves fell to the ground, unmoving.

Leviathan deceased, CD-8

I smiled.


	4. A Quicker End

The sun rose over Brockton Bay, golden light streaming over skyscrapers and trees.

Taylor jogged a little faster. She had two hours before the meeting with Lisa and the Undersiders.

She reached her house and slowed down, taking the steps up to the door at a much slower pace. She was young, fit, and had access to very good healers, but there was a finite amount of exercise that could be done before she got tired.

Unlocking the door, she stepped inside and closed it behind her. She looked around at her house. No more sharing a loft or a PRT building, no more probation, no more troopers and capes watching her every move. There was a nice fireplace, the mantle above it adorned with pictures. A large flat screen TV sat mounted on the wall, a couch and several chairs arrayed to face it. The next room over was the dining room, and next to that was the kitchen. Her house, and hers alone.

Well, not entirely hers alone.

"Honey, I'm home!" she yelled at the top of her lungs.

A sort of muted grumbling came from the bundle of blankets on the couch.

"Wake up! We have a meeting in less than two hours Everett!" she said as she walked over to the pile and smacked it.

"Fine, fine. I'm getting up. Just five minutes." Everett grumbled, looking up at her.

This was a mistake, because she was currently glaring at him.

Someone who had not been on the receiving end of a glare from Taylor Anne Hebert, Skitter, former Warlord of Brockton Bay, Weaver, the one-time General of the Defense of Earth, and current leader of Wardens NE would possibly not understand why Everett immediately jumped up and started towards his room where his costume lay.

Those who had would understand perfectly.

"Nevermind, getting dressed ma'am!" he said, rushing towards his room.

"That's right!" she said playfully, starting off towards the shower to wash off the accumulated sweat from her run. As she did so she glanced at the mantle she had passed, her eyes catching on one frame in particular.

_Panic and hysteria reigned as Scion began laying waste to the world. But not all were gripped by it._

A medal. Awarded for services to the United States of America and Humanity. They had almost given her the Medal of Honor, but then decided that that simply wasn't grand enough- they had made a whole new one and called it the Weaver Medal. She was the only living recipient- the only other person to ever receive one being Eidolon, posthumously.

_The Protectorate, Haven, the Ambassadors, the Undersiders, the Elite, Cauldron, the Yangban, The Elitnaya Armiya, the Irregulars- all gathered to fight this threat to the very existence to humanity. They bickered and squabbled and debated about who was to lead. _

She hadn't gotten it for fighting directly- she had fought directly, but she was only able to do so because of Doormaker's portals, and the bugs hadn't had any great effect.

_Eidolon tried to assert control, but failed as the Irregulars utterly refused to work under him._

_As the meeting spiralled further and further out of control, one person stepped forwards and took the lead._

"_SILENCE!" she shouted._

_The room obeyed._

No, she got that medal for leadership. She took charge when no one else could or would. She rallied the forces of humanity against the great evil of Scion and won. Part of the award was also the disappearance of the Endbringers; they had vanished when Scion had died.

_A scrap of green cape fluttered to the ground. Legend bent down and picked it up, his face grim._

"_He held Scion for three hours. No matter what else he may have done, he died a hero."_

She still thought they had given her too much credit. She had led the army, yes, but they had done the work.

_A dozen tinkers worked frantically on a massive device, vaguely cannon-shaped. This weapon would reach across dimensions to strike at Scion's true form. Out of all of them, Defiant and Dragon worked the fastest, mechanical might surpassing human frailty in this race against time._

_Elsewhere, Foil readied herself. Her power was thought to be able to harm Scion. She was duty bound to try._

_For Sabah._

And tens of millions had still been lost. She doubted anyone could have really stopped that, but it still burned that she couldn't save everyone.

_Washington was enveloped in golden light. Nothing of strategic value against Scion was lost, but it was a powerful blow to the morale of the American capes. _

_Even as the immense stress from running a planetary defense began taking its toll, Weaver rallied them with a rousing speech promising revenge against Scion and preventing this from happening to more cities and nations._

Still, in the end, victory had been theirs. Scion had fallen, and the surviving soldiers cheered.

_Scion's golden body stood stock still for a moment before disappearing entirely. The army watched with bated breath, weapons and powers at the ready._

_Nothing happened for ten minutes. _

_Then the cheering started._

"_Weaver! Weaver! Weaver!"_

_It was picked up by the news broadcasts Dragon had been sending out, and the entire world took up the chant._

"_WEAVER! WEAVER! WEAVER!"_

Then the world began to pick up the pieces.

_...Rebuilding efforts are still ongoing across the eastern seaboard, with extensive progress being made in Atlanta and New York…_

_...Protectorate and PRT being dissolved and reformed into single organization by the name of "Wardens"..._

_...Ambassadors granted pardon for services rendered during Gold Morning..._

But not everyone celebrated.

_...South African government collapsed on Tuesday after a newly triggered parahuman blew up their parliament building…_

_...new cult based around Scion, much like the Fallen, called The Golden…_

_...Golden assault on New London Suits team temporary headquarters repelled with massive casualties…_

That was the purpose of this meeting with her old teammates. A Fallen sect had been sniffing around the newly rebuilt Docks recently and that probably meant they were up to no good. The Fallen enjoyed trying to do the Endbringers' jobs for them after they disappeared- wrecking ports, attacking power plants, releasing mental patients…

None of these had anywhere near the effect the Endbringers had had on the cities, but it definitely wasn't helping, and there were a finite amount of resources to commit to rebuilding and the Fallen and Golden were forcing people to waste it.

Taylor finished her shower quickly and slipped off her wedding ring before she slipped on her costume. It hadn't changed since Gold Morning, still the white, blue, and gray with the insect theme. She left their room to find Tecton waiting for her in the living room.

For most capes, dressing into costume and then walking to the Wardens Regional Headquarters from their house would be a problem, but Taylor had been outed years ago and Everett decided that he didn't much care anymore.

They both piled into their SUV and drove off towards Headquarters where the Undersiders would be waiting for her. The trip was peaceful…

Or would have been if half the street hadn't exploded.


End file.
